Five Strips of Flesh

Five new tales from horror writer Christopher R. Cox.

Suicyclone

“The SuiCyclone was another fast coaster- technically the third in the park. Six riders at a time would be lifted up to the first peak, 1,670 feet up in the air, before rocketing 1,600 feet towards the ground at 200 miles per hour. Just 70 feet above the treetops, it would level out and hit seven tight invasions, each one smaller than the last. By the end of the three-minute ride, each rider would be dead.”

Ollie didn’t understand how the ride worked. But then again, he didn’t need to. He worked in the body pit- more formally known as the remains recover area at the end of the ride- and his job was to prepare the riders for a dignified burial.

Sometimes, not every rider is ready to be get off.

The North Bay Bridge Club

Three friends, each with a different reason for leaving their small home towns. They only need to make it as far as the next town over, but life has other plans.

Dahmer Flu

This is the original short story, later expanded into the full-length novel of the same name.

Humanity’s bitter end was bloody and violent. In those final days, the air was filled with the smell of decay and the moans of the undead; it wasn't long before society crumbled entirely.

Bradley Harris lost everything then. All he had left was his family, and he would do anything he had to do to keep his pregnant wife and two children alive. Whether on foot or on the road, they’ll keep pressing north, hoping to get above the snow line and wait out the apocalypse.

The only problem is there’s no end in sight.

This terrifying tale explores what happens when a family is forced to adapt to a changing world, or die trying. And when disaster strikes, they begin to wonder- can the living be worse than the undead?

Shadows

Death is a shadow. An ever-present, timeless force that lurks just outside of our vision. Always nearby, always waiting.

When one of the many shadows becomes aware of itself, it finds that it can not only take the dead- it can also kill.

Unlike most, Dante Inferno Quinn can see that shadow. When it takes someone closest to him, he’s powerless to stop it. Finding it again becomes an obsession, and he’ll do anything to prove to his wife that their child didn’t just die, but that their son was murdered.

Anything.

The Judas Goat

Brett and Ella were the last two residents of Fairview. Everyone else left in the evacuations. Everyone else was now dead. That didn’t stop them from coming back home.

Determined to survive, the pair holds their own by scavenging the surrounding towns. Forced further and further out, each trip becomes more dangerous than the last.